What really shines at the Off Broadway Theater is the improvisational show Quick Wits, which runs Friday and Saturday nights at 10 PM for about an hour and a half. The show, which emcee Bob Bedore tells us is, obviously, never the same twice, is consistently inventive, clever and funny. What makes Quick Witswork is that each skit has an overall structure within which the improvising occurs. Then Bedore solicits suggestions for situations, characters and lines of dialogue that have to be incorporated into the scenes.
The night I saw the show, two four-person teams, the dimwits and the half-wits, competed against each other, wearing bright bowling shirts in contrasting colors to distinguish them. Teams received points from a three-person jury in the audience. Improv formats included "A To Z Storytelling," where two actors had to invent a story about a rodeo in words that start with consecutive letters; a form of "Jeopardy" in which the categories were languages, desert reptiles, toiletries and cereal; and a press conference held by the first man to grow a tail.
One of the funniest skits, "Pieces of Paper," involved a story about ice fishing which had to include these lines supplied by the audience: "I've got you under my skin," "You killed my gigapig," and "Would you like that super size?" Another favorite was "Missing Shakespeare," where the actors had to invent a scene from Romeo and Juliet set in a Taco Bell. The actors were focused and very funny and worked beautifully together.
